Category: hack

Do you have a favorite household gadget? Do you reach for your drill or take out your handy roll of duct tape whenever there’s a problem? Most of us have tools that we are partial to, our tried and true saviors that have gotten us out of a bind time and time again.

When it comes to cybercrime, hackers also tend to stick with certain tools, ones that are proven to be more effective and more forceful than the rest. Sure, sometimes hackers may go out on a limb and experiment with a new technique, but by and large, the threats we face all stem from the same tactics, with some tweaks to the code here and there. In 2015, there were some things that proved essential in so many hackers’ tool kits – Why bother with originality when the old tried and true tools work so well?

It’s these standbys that we have to be the most vigilant about, and there’s a lot we can learn from these tools about how we arm ourselves better for 2016 and beyond.

Unless you were living under a rock this week (and maybe even then), you’ve heard about the recent data breach affecting the US Office of Personnel Management (OPM).

The hack involved personnel files relating to 4 million current and former members of the federal government. In other words, about one percent of the entire US population. It affected nearly every single federal agency, exposing people’s names, addresses, social security numbers, job details, training information, and more.

This was one very big hack indeed. It shows that the threat posed by hackers is increasing every day. It shows that everyone needs to take online security seriously. It also shows that all of us could be victims, and this means all of us must be proactive in protecting ourselves.